Obama's anti-youth agenda

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Some groups predict premiums for young people may increase by as much as 50 percent.

But the Obama agenda isn’t just hitting young people in their wallets. It’s tearing their souls, literally and figuratively. With his Supreme Court picks and by advocating taxpayer funding of abortion.

Obama has advanced the abortion rights cause more than any other president. Obama’s position on abortion can credibly be called pro-abortion, not pro-abortion rights, because, through numerous measures, he is compelling all Americans to underwrite the procedure.

By promoting it, Obama dismisses the beliefs of millions of pro-life young people. Poll after poll shows 18-to-30 year olds are the most pro-life demographic in a generation.

Polls show that while young Americans continue to like Obama personally, many have been put off by his — and the Democrats’ — policies. Despite Obama’s repeated appeals, polls show little enthusiasm among young voters heading into the 2010 elections. A May Gallup poll found only one in four 18-to-29 year olds were “very enthusiastic” about voting in the midterms, the lowest of any age group.

It’s easy to see why young Americans are so apathetic. For voters who believed that Obama’s rise, as the candidate said in a June 2008 campaign rally, “was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal,” the image of a leader watching haplessly as an oil leak continues to gush after two months must be discouraging.

For voters who believed Candidate Obama’s promises of post-partisanship, transparency and accountability, the Obama administration’s role in fixing primary contests would make even the most wide-eyed young Obama supporter a little disillusioned.

And for those who believed Obama’s emphatic rhetoric about standing up to rogue regimes with abysmal human rights records, his neglect of humanitarian violations in places like China, Iran and Sudan is sorely disappointing.

As a presidential candidate, Obama’s youth support derived from his perceived coolness. He was young and biracial. He played basketball and listened to Jay-Z. He peddled inclusive and uncomplicated slogans like “Yes We Can!” and “Change You Can Believe In.”

Perhaps most of all, Obama constantly told young voters that his agenda was designed with their best interests in mind. We’re doing this “for the next generation” was his mantra.

But two years later, many young people are searching for jobs and finding only a president who increasingly fails to reflect their values and priorities.

Gary Bauer is president of American Values and chairman of the Campaign for Working Families.

The youth of America will ALWAYS pay for their gullibility, serves them right. They have to pay the consequence for their foolishness; they'd be paying for years and years until they die. As always, youth is wasted on the young.

This article is absolutely absurd. Written by the President of a pro-life organization, wildly slanted, and not backed up whatsoever. As an young Obama Republican, I can say that my generation and fellow supporters are actually doing alright. All of you who jumped on the vindictive are not surprising. The extreme right loves to hear itself talk, facts be damned. Our insurance will go up $42 next year for those over 25, while most of us will still be covered by our parents? Yeah, that's a real travesty. Nothing mentioned in the article says anything about specific policy points by the President that led to an increased unemployment rate in my generation, because they don't exist. Then there are the actual quotes:

"Some groups predict premiums for young people may increase by as much as 50 percent." - which groups? based on what?

"Obama’s position on abortion can credibly be called pro-abortion, not pro-abortion rights, because, through numerous measures, he is compelling all Americans to underwrite the procedure." - said the pro-life president...

"Poll after poll shows 18-to-30 year olds are the most pro-life demographic in a generation." - This is the worst of all. Mr. Bauer, you're using the internet now. You can link each of those instances of "poll" with some facts. It would be great. We could click on the link and immediately go look at the facts backing this up. Do you not know that's available to you, too lazy to do it, or just don't want to? I personally find this incredibly hard to believe. I'd love to see one Gallup or USA Today poll that backed this up. Frankly, this was available to you throughout your article, and it would have provided a great amount of authority to your otherwise right wing article.

I wish this had a huge label that read "baseless opinion article" as a header so I could have just skipped it and gone on with my day.

This article is absolutely absurd. Written by the President of a pro-life organization, wildly slanted, and not backed up whatsoever. As an young Obama Republican, I can say that my generation and fellow supporters are actually doing alright. All of you who jumped on the vindictive are not surprising. The extreme right loves to hear itself talk, facts be damned. Our insurance will go up $42 next year for those over 25, while most of us will still be covered by our parents? Yeah, that's a real travesty. Nothing mentioned in the article says anything about specific policy points by the President that led to an increased unemployment rate in my generation, because they don't exist. Then there are the actual quotes:

"Some groups predict premiums for young people may increase by as much as 50 percent." - which groups? based on what?

"Obama’s position on abortion can credibly be called pro-abortion, not pro-abortion rights, because, through numerous measures, he is compelling all Americans to underwrite the procedure." - said the pro-life president...

"Poll after poll shows 18-to-30 year olds are the most pro-life demographic in a generation." - This is the worst of all. Mr. Bauer, you're using the internet now. You can link each of those instances of "poll" with some facts. It would be great. We could click on the link and immediately go look at the facts backing this up. Do you not know that's available to you, too lazy to do it, or just don't want to? I personally find this incredibly hard to believe. I'd love to see one Gallup or USA Today poll that backed this up. Frankly, this was available to you throughout your article, and it would have provided a great amount of authority to your otherwise right wing article.

I wish this had a huge label that read "baseless opinion article" as a header so I could have just skipped it and gone on with my day.

What complete misinformation. Thank you, "just thinkin" for the exposure about who the heck is Gary Bauer. I'm a fan of politics and I guess Gary Bauer is so inconsequential that I forgot he once tried to run for President. Politico certainly didn't say who he was, but I guess anyone can write an opinion??? Baurer's point by point dismissal of the President's agenda all leads to an anti-youth agenda. What rubbish. Politico didn't even use the poor ABC truth-o-meter!

Gary Bauer is president of American Values and chairman of the Campaign for Working Families.

Politico fails to provide the background of Bauer, who like most dishonest, strident Republican conservatives, hides behind a nice sounding organizational name, but is among the most extremest GOP operatives. Apparently, Politico will run anything rather than do actual reporting or fact-checking. Bauer complains about everything of course. The high unemployment caused by the GOP (Greed On Parade) crowd and the Bush/Cheney nightmare has merely trickled down to the young. If the GOP had their way there would be no jobs bill, no money for the states to create jobs, no youth programs, no Work For America, Peace Corps, etc.. Their idea of community involvement is incarceration, particularly among blacks, and under successive GOP administrations those in jail went from 700,000 in the '70s to 2.2 million today or 1 in 100 Americans.

President Obama has not been "pro-abortion," but rather maintained the current law of a woman's right to choose, to maintain control over her body rather than having the government impose upon her. If men had babies, this would be a non-issue. Bauer does not point out that their anti-birth control policies like the Catholic church have spread poverty, death and misery to millions around the globe, particularly in Latin America, the Phillipines, and Africa. They want to impose their narrow-minded views on everybody. They are not Pro-Life. Their concern for children expires after nine months. They have shut down birth control, prenatal, and heathcare clinics in rural and poverty-stricken areas particularly throughout the South resulting in death, heath issues, and unwanted pregnancies. There are not altruistic people despite the rhetoric. They really don't care about women, rape victums, battered wives, unskilled, needy women. The GOP is the party of death and destruction, the pro-war, pro-war profiteering. Chinless whimps like Bauer avoid the military, or serving the country or simply being ***** slapped like other less than manly men like Georgie Bush, Princeton puss would be.

This is absolute drivel. Does this article actually suggest that Obama created the recession which was well underway before anyone even voted for him? That's how it sounded to me. And did Bauer really back up a statisical claims with statements like "a recent analysis finds..." and "poll after poll shows..."? Didn't his 5th grade teacher tell him to cite his sources?

POLITICO, I don't care who you publish for opinion content, right or left wing, but how about checking to make sure it's not utter garbage before putting it on the web for all to see?

As someone still fairly early in years I cannot help but offer at least some perspective on the argument made here. I was born in 1983 and am what is referred to as a 'Cusper' (on the cusp between the absurdly named 'Generation X' and the 'Millennial Generation'). While I will leave the minutiae of policy debates to those better suited to it, I would like to address the generational aspect of this essay.

Though many would like the premise put forth -- young people will feel duped by the president -- to be true, I can hardly see why that would be the case. The argument seems to say that as our national debt grows, as graduates are left wanting in the pursuit of employment, and because there will be a requirement for citizens to carry health insurance, young people will be impacted negatively -- at least in respect to their pocket books -- and should revolt when it comes election time.

However, this theory doesn't really manage to see the forest through the trees. What it does not take into account is that young people feel obliged to support many of these measures. Many may not contemplate the future financial costs to them, many do. But I would suggest that the financial costs aren't necessarily the 'heavy' for Millennials.

The Millennial generation come into their full duty as citizens in a nation -- which should be the envy of the world in every respect -- with an almost criminally neglected and crumbling infrastructure, a failing education system, a health care system which they've seen deny sick or dying friends and relatives care because they can no longer afford premiums or co-pays, and a corporate culture more like that of the oligarchs of Rome than the shop keepers, manufacturers and farmers from the capitalism of our textbooks.

What, in my experience, people of the younger generations realize is that these problems, and many more, are reaching a critical mass. We may not like the financial burden we must bear. We may not agree with every aspect of every policy. But we generally see (rightly or wrongly) the older generations as greedy and irresponsible -- which is upsetting because, historically that should be our shtick. To us, the reason we are so burdened is that our parent's generations have ceded their responsibility. To us, it's not that the President has caused this offense, but everyone who came before and refused to sacrifice and instead lazily suckled at the teet of the accomplishments of 'the Greatest Generation,' until it was barren and withered.

Simply put: Younger people feel it their duty to bare the costs of recent policy for the same reason generations before have done the same. As citizens of the greatest republic in all of human history we feel it our duty and responsibility. Something that has seemed to be lacking for many years up until now.

What, in my experience, people of the younger generations realize is that these problems, and many more, are reaching a critical mass. We may not like the financial burden we must bear. We may not agree with every aspect of every policy. But we generally see (rightly or wrongly) the older generations as greedy and irresponsible -- which is upsetting because, historically that should be our shtick. To us, the reason we are so burdened is that our parent's generations have ceded their responsibility. To us, it's not that the President has caused this offense, but everyone who came before and refused to sacrifice and instead lazily suckled at the teet of the accomplishments of 'the Greatest Generation,' until it was barren and withered.